A replacement board turns an old Echo Dot into a local Home Assistant voice assistant
A third-generation Amazon Echo Dot can be repurposed as a local voice assistant using a replacement circuit board called LocalDot. Developed by AAElectronics, it replaces one of the original circuit boards and connects the speaker to a Home Assistant server. The original enclosure, four-microphone array, speaker, buttons and LED ring are retained, allowing users to reuse existing hardware.
LocalDot uses two Espressif processors, which are ESP32-S3 for Wi-Fi and device control, and ESP32-P4 for audio-processing. The speaker is driven by the TAS5805 amplifier, and the audio-processing system uses the microphone array for beamforming. Wake-word detection takes place in the device itself, and then commands are passed to Home Assistant through the local network. Smart-home features can function without Amazon cloud servers as long as all services are running locally.
Board compatibility is confirmed for both Donut and Crumpet versions of the third-generation Echo Dot. The board for the Clock version has not yet been tested. Modification requires swapping out the original board without any soldering work or cutting of the case. The original 12V power adapter is also reused. Voice pipeline in Home Assistant must be already set up. Minimum hardware specification not known yet.
The product is being marketed through the use of crowdfunding. For one board, it costs $50, for two boards, it costs $98, and for three boards, it costs $145. Shipping is priced at $8 for the US and $18 for international orders. The campaign ends on 17 December 2026, and shipping will be done starting 17 April 2027. Mouser Electronics is expected to handle order fulfilment.
The developer intends to release schematics, PCB layout, bill of materials, and firmware of the project. In terms of public availability, the current version of the repository contains a schematic 2.0 and a connector pinout. Other design documents are still being prepared. The hardware is intended to be released under the CERN-OHL-S-2.0 license, although no license file was found in the repository.
However, even though LocalDot does not send voice commands through Amazon’s servers, the overall privacy is dependent on the connected services to the Home Assistant platform. It is possible to ensure that the processing takes place locally if the speech-to-text and text-to-speech services are hosted locally.
LocalDot could offer Indian users a way to give older Echo Dot devices a new lease of life. Nevertheless, details about delivery, import cost, and total cost of delivery remain unclear. The next crucial step would be the availability of all necessary hardware files, firmware, and instructions on how to install the board.
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